Heritage sites across the North East will be enhanced with wildflower meadows in a long-lasting floral celebration of the Coronation.
English Heritage is working with Plantlife – Europe’s largest charity dedicated to saving wild plants and fungi – on an initiative which will span the next 10 years. Eight English Heritage sites in the region will benefit from a return of flower-rich hay meadows which once made the countryside a much more colourful spectacle than is the case today.
Since the 1930s and the advent of post-war modern farming practices, the UK has lost 97% of its meadows, with a severe knock-on impact on insects and pollinators such as bees, butterflies and moths and other wildlife, including bird species. English Heritage said the project would leave a natural legacy by working to restore the country’s lost flower-rich glasslands, in tribute to Charles’s love of the natural world. The King, who will be crowned on May 6, is known to be a passionate gardener who is committed to organic farming, promoting biodiversity and has long campaigned in the fight against climate change.
